Perceptions of Police Shootings of Black Men

A police shooting of a black man  —  clearly unjustified in this instance  —  and the reaction to it, are once again in the news.  The nature and extent of the reaction got me curious about what people actually believe about the frequency of such episodes.

As it happens, this has been studied.  The Skeptic Research Center found that, among people who view themselves as “very liberal,” more than half think the number of unarmed black people killed by the police in one year (2019) was roughly 1000 if not more.  Almost eight percent of that cohort thought the number was in excess of 10,000.

How close is that to the truth?

According to database compiled by Mapping Police Violence and reported in the Post’s account, the actual number of black men killed by the police in 2019 was 27.

As the New York Post story relates it:

A new survey commissioned by Skeptic Research Center reveals the extent to which the public is misinformed on the issue of police violence. Participants across the political spectrum in the nationally representative survey were asked how many unarmed black men were killed by police in 2019. The results were revealing. Overall, nearly half of surveyed liberals (44 percent) estimated roughly between 1,000 and 10,000 unarmed black men were killed whereas 20 percent of conservatives estimated the same.

Most notably, the majority of respondents in each political category believed that police killed unarmed black men at an exponentially higher rate than in reality. Over 80 percent of liberals guessed at least 100 unarmed black men were killed compared to 66 percent of moderates and 54 percent of conservatives. But, according to a close database compiled by Mapping Police Violence, the actual number of black men killed by the police in 2019 is 27.

Here’s the depressing but illuminating graph: